


It's Not the Explanation Coulson Expected

by KatmaTui



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Gen, One Shot, how did Talbot get the arm injury, what if
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-16
Updated: 2015-01-16
Packaged: 2018-03-07 09:24:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3169730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KatmaTui/pseuds/KatmaTui
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Coulson can't help but wonder if Gerenal Talbot has an ulterior motive after his attitude change following the UN attack, so he pays the General a visit. The answer is not what he expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Not the Explanation Coulson Expected

Something had gnawed at Director Coulson since the UN attack. It took him a few weeks to realize that it wasn't just that so many people had accepted that S.H.I.E.L.D. would orchestrate an attack like that. No, it was the realization that General Talbot had gone that easily from reluctant cooperation to S.H.I.E.L.D. defender in such a short time that clawed at the back of his mind. Did the man have an agenda? Perhaps lull them into a false sense of security and then hit them while they had their guard down? Whatever it was, Coulson needed to know. 

Skye took less than five minutes to dig up General Talbot's home address. It had taken her slightly longer to access his military records and find that he was still on medical leave. Coulson had driven around the quiet suburban neighborhood nearly ten minutes before he decided to pull in to the long driveway. Two houses down a man in overalls and a straw hat steered a wheelbarrow somewhere off behind his house. A woman jogged down the street with her two dogs. If it were possible to feel any more over dressed and out of place than Coulson did at that moment he didn't know how. Talbot answered his door in exercise pants, a faded tshirt, bare feet and his arm still in a sling. He looked, well, normal. And perturbed. Definitely perturbed. The phrase "treading on thin ice" came to mind. Talbot used his good hand, which also held a beer bottle to push open the storm door. The General leaned against the door frame and surveyed the sky overhead.

"What are you looking for?" Coulson asked him.

"Stealth aircraft," the General said.

"It's just me today," Coulson said. "I was hoping we could talk. Without handcuffs. Or stealth planes for that matter. If it's not a bad time that is."

"Talk about what?"

"The attack on the UN for one thing," Coulson replied. He felt his head bob from side to side. "Mostly that actually." 

Talbot's eyes narrowed as he stared at Coulson. It was somewhere between seconds and forever. The General pushed the storm door open wider and let Coulson in. Before he could say thank you, Talbot had already begun to walk down the hallway. Coulson had no choice but to follow. He passed a formal living room that was so clean Coulson wondered if anyone was actually allowed in it. Across the hall from that was a dining room with Lego strewn across the table. The entry hall emptied out into a huge kitchen. Glass clinked against glass as Talbot tossed his bottle into a recycle bin under the counter. The General opened the refrigerator and pulled out another beer. He stopped, looked at Coulson and offered the beer.

"Thank you," Coulson said. He stepped forward and took the beer. "For this and for talking to me."

Talbot shrugged and pulled another beer out of the packed fridge. He motioned toward a table in nook between the kitchen and a family room and the two sat down. 

"I'm sure your people have read all the accounts, including mine, of the UN attack," Talbot said. "There's plenty of camera footage too. I'm not sure what else I could help you with."

"It's not really about the footage or the eyewitness accounts," Coulson said. "It's about your reaction to the whole thing."

"How do you mean?" Talbot leaned back in his chair and adjusted the sling with his good hand. 

"We, more appropriately, I forced you into working with us," Coulson began. "I always felt that, prior to the UN attack, given the opportunity if the arrangement no longer benefited you, you would have had no problem going back to hunting us." 

"That would be a correct assessment of things," Talbot replied. 

There was nothing apologetic about it, he simply stated it as a fact and left it at that. Coulson nodded and took a drink.

"But after the attack, you defended us with Senator Ward," Coulson said. "And you treated my team in Belgium very decently to say the least. I guess I want to know why."

"You went to all the trouble to get me to work with you," Talbot said. "Your methods were underhanded in my book, but you really never had any intention of hurting me. And you saved my family. I just found it really hard to believe that you would turn around an blow it all to Hell with an outright attack on unarmed people in front of the press. It didn't feel right. I figured you must have really rattled someone's cage to get them to go to that much trouble to try and tear down what was left of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s reputation."

"See, that's a really great answer, but I can't help but feel that there's more to it than that," Coulson said.

Talbot opened his mouth to say something and instead drank. Once he put the bottle back on the table he peeled at the edge of the label as best he could with one hand. He didn't look up at Coulson when he spoke.

"Those weapons they were throwing," Talbot began.

"I'm going to stop you there," Coulson said. "Because if this is about to turn in to you wanting that technology for the military, the answer is no. It will always be no."

Talbot held up his good hand and waved Coulson off.

"No, that's not where I'm going with this," he said. "Is it alien? The technology behind that?"

"Yes."

"And those things can just do that? Turn people to ash in seconds?" Talbot snapped his fingers. "Just like that?"

"Just like that."

Talbot rubbed at his chin.

"Everyone they hit goes that fast? There's no way to stop it once it hits someone?" he asked the Director.

"As best as we can tell, that's correct." 

Coulson took another drink. He wasn't sure how much he should share with the General. He still couldn't shake the feeling there was more going on. Less is more still felt like the path to take. He realized he was now staring at an empty chair. Talbot was up and back at the refrigerator. He had the freezer door open and pulled out a small red plastic coffee can that frosted over as soon as it met room temperature. Back at the table, Talbot peeled the lid off and tipped the can over. One of the discs from the UN attack spilled out onto the table.

Coulson pushed himself and the chair back away from it. Before he could stop the General, Talbot picked it up and studied it. The disc glowed at the General's touch.

"If everyone turns to ash in seconds, then why was I able to dig this thing out of my arm?" Talbot asked. "And why does it glow like this when I pick it up?"

Coulson could hear himself stammer and then gave up trying to articulate the questions that were rapid firing inside his head. He gave up and just shook his head.

**Author's Note:**

> I got this idea while doing some Talbot centric reseach for my story in progress "This Is Not What I Signed Up For". I stumbled across this article: http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=57744 in which the author believes that Talbot got hit by one of the Diviner type discs in "A Fractured House" and didn't get turned to ash because he was deemed "worthy" by the Diviner. I'm thinking I might tie it in to my current work, but in case I don't I just wanted to get it out of my head. I've seen one other article that thought he was hit by one is well, but they went the direction that Talbot was killed and has been replaced by a Hydra operative. I don't like that take mainly because they already pulled the "Oh it's Talbot, hey look it's not really him" thing and doing it again seems like a cop out.


End file.
